Click here to receive Mediabistro’s Morning Media Newsfeed via email.Snowden on the Run, Seeks Asylum in Ecuador (CNN)
The computer contractor who exposed details of U.S. surveillance programs was on the run late Sunday, seeking asylum in Ecuador with the aid of the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, the organization and Ecuador’s Foreign Ministry announced. Edward Snowden left Hong Kong after Washington sought his extradition on espionage charges, according to WikiLeaks, which facilitates the publication of classified information. TechCrunch / CrunchGov While Ecuador has been a safe haven for world-class leakers in the past, including WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange, the country is no utopia for journalists. Given a “Partly Free” rating by Freedom House’s Freedom of the Press scale, their report notes: “Attacks on journalists and media houses continue to rise. In 2011, Fundamedios, the national press freedom watchdog organization, cited nearly 150 incidents of aggression (physical, verbal, and legal) against the media by authorities as well as by ordinary citizens.” HuffPostMeet the Press host David Gregory asked columnist Glenn Greenwald why he shouldn’t be charged with a crime for working with Snowden. At the tail end of the conversation, Gregory suddenly asked Greenwald why the government shouldn’t be going after him: “To the extent that you have aided and abetted Snowden, even in his current movements, why shouldn’t you, Mr. Greenwald, be charged with a crime?” he asked. Greenwald replied that it was “pretty extraordinary that anybody who would call themselves a journalist would publicly muse about whether or not other journalists should be charged with felonies,” and that there was no evidence to back up Gregory’s claim that he had “aided” Snowden. TVNewser Following his appearance on Meet the Press, Greenwald called out Gregory on Twitter for asking a question about whether Greenwald or the Guardian should or will face charges for their role in the Snowden NSA document revelation. Howard Kurtz asked Greenwald the same question two hours later on Reliable Sources. PressThink / Jay Rosen Gregory does not know it, but journalism with a point of view, journalism in the style that calls for viewlessness, and advocacy journalism can all deliver good work in the imperfect art of source-driven reportage and commentary. BuzzFeed / Ben Smith Snowden’s flight and its surrounding geopolitics are a good story; what he made public is a better one. I’m not sure why reporters should care all that much about his personal moral status, the meaning of the phrase “civil disobedience,” or the fate of his eternal soul. And the public who used to be known as “readers” are going to have to get used to making that distinction.

Food Network Drops Paula Deen (TVNewser)
The Food Network dropped Paula Deen amid controversy over her use of racial slurs. The news comes at the end of a bizarre Friday for Deen, who canceled a planned appearance on the Today show in the morning due to “exhaustion” and then released two different versions of a video apology in the afternoon. “Food Network will not renew Paula Deen’s contract when it expires at the end of this month,” the network said in a statement. PRNewser As we saw in the case of Michael Richards (Seinfeld‘s Kramer), the sound of racial epithets are a bell that can’t be unrung. The allegations made in the complaint and comments made in the deposition are appalling. The audience is left with the impression that the 66-year-old white-haired woman with all that Southern charm and all that butter is actually a fraud. Eater Food Network completely scrubbed Deen from its programming lineup. Saturday’s schedule originally had two episodes of Paula’s Best Dishes (scheduled for 9 and 9:30 a.m. EST) but they were replaced with two episodes of Giada at Home. On Sunday, Paula’s Best Dishes was to air at 9:30 a.m. EST, but instead it was replaced with an episode of The Pioneer Woman. Also: Paula’s Best Dishes normally airs at 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. on weekdays, but it is no longer on the schedule. The Birmingham News / AL.com The fate of Deen’s magazine, Cooking with Paula Deen, is still up in the air. “We are not in a position to discuss her magazine and contract right now,” said Phyllis Hoffman DePiano, the president of Birmingham-based Hoffman Media, which produces the magazine.

Gawker’s Unpaid Interns Sue After Fox Searchlight Ruling (Bloomberg)
Gawker Media LLC was sued by unpaid interns who allege the online publisher violated minimum-wage law, days after a federal judge ruled in a similar case that interns at Fox Searchlight Pictures Inc. should have been paid. In the Gawker case, filed last week in Manhattan federal court, three former interns said they each spent at least 15 hours a week working on blogs affiliated with the New York media company and were “not paid a single cent.” The Atlantic Wire Aulistar Mark, Andrew Hudson and Hanchen Lu held summer internships within the Gawker network between 2008 and 2010. Mark and Hudson worked for Kotaku and i09, respectively, but Lu has no detectable presence on any Gawker sites that we could find. TheWrap The suits follows a series of legal actions against media companies for their use of unpaid interns in the wake of a partial judgment against Fox Searchlight for its use of interns on Black Swan. “We don’t want to replace entry level jobs with interns who aren’t being paid,” attorney Andrea M. Paparella, who is representing the interns, said in a statement provided to TheWrap. NY Mag / Daily Intelligencer To be fair, Gawker, whose writers have called out others for exploiting interns (and, more recently, questioned the high wages of Google interns), began paying their interns last fall. (In January, they posted a job listing for paid “Editorial Fellows,” whose duties seem to include those previously performed by interns.)

Disappointing Fall for Rock Center, A News Program With Big Ambitions (NYT)
If the decision to cancel Rock Center was not surprising, it was still dismaying to Brian Williams and to others on the staff, some of whom lost their jobs after Friday’s final broadcast. (Many others will be absorbed by other NBC News programs.) One staff member said Williams felt insulted by the network’s decision; another said what pained Williams most were the layoffs.

More Than 35 Newsroom Staff Laid Off at The Oregonian (Willamette Week / News Blog)
Sources tell Willamette Week that The Oregonian has laid off about 95 employees in the last few days — at least 45 in the editorial department. That number, which is reportedly near final, would represent one quarter of a 175-person newsroom.

Roll Call Nixes Friday Print Edition (FishbowlDC)Roll Call will soon drop its Friday print edition. Look for the change to happen after the July recess. Beth Bronder, SVP and publisher of CQ Roll Call, told FishbowlDC the following in an email through a publicist: “As with most other media organizations, the way CQ Roll Call readers consume news and information continues to shift dramatically from print to online, and Roll Call is aggressively focusing our attention on digital-first editorial features that appeal to readers and advertisers alike.”

Rolling Stone Publisher Fired (Adweek)
Jann Wenner has dismissed the publisher of his flagship Rolling Stone, Matt Mastrangelo. Mastrangelo had been in the position for three years (12 years in all at Wenner Media), and first-quarter ad pages were up 17 percent year over year to 190. But Wenner is known to shuffle the publishing decks every few years at the magazine he co-founded. Mastrangelo got the word Friday morning, but apparently was told simply, “They are making a change.” FishbowlNY Let’s hope Wenner didn’t fire Mastrangelo to replace him with a cousin or an aunt. Or an uncle.

British Invasion Reshuffles U.S. Media (NYT)
When it comes to choosing someone to steer prominent American media properties, the answer is often delivered in a proper British accent. The observation about the thicket of British talent has been made elsewhere and is hardly a brand new phenomenon — it’s Tina Brown’s and Nick Denton’s world, we just surf it. But something is at work here, beyond the joke about a British accent adding 10 I.Q. points.

Yahoo! News Issues Correction After Describing Kenya as Obama’s Birthplace (TPM / LiveWire)
Yahoo! News issued a correction Friday evening after a reporter mistakenly referred to Kenya as President Barack Obama’s birthplace. A piece on Obama’s upcoming trip to Africa by Rachel Rose Hartman included a lede that echoed sentiments heard among the “birther” movement: “President Barack Obama makes the first extended trip to Africa of his presidency next week — but he won’t be stopping in the country of his birth,” Hartman originally wrote.

Show Some Spine (NYT / Sunday Book Review)
A plague of women’s backs is upon us in the book cover world. We’ve recently seen Finding Casey, by Jo-Ann Mapson; The Unruly Passion of Eugénie R., by Carole DeSanti; and The Headmaster’s Wager, by Vincent Lam, all showcasing a nape-and-shoulder combo on the jacket. The Pretty One, by Lucinda Rosenfeld, features three women with their backs turned; The Smart One, by Jennifer Close, has its heroine turned away, undoing her wrap dress; and a bride stands facing a beach on Beautiful Day, by Elin Hilderbrand.

Michael Hastings Obituary Did Not Capture His Adversarial Spirit (NYT / Public Editor’s Journal)
An obituary of the journalist Michael Hastings missed an opportunity to convey to Times readers what a distinctive figure he was in American journalism. The obituary, which has drawn criticism — most notably in a strongly worded email from Hastings’ widow, Elise Jordan, to the executive editor, Jill Abramson, and others at the Times, including the public editor’s office — is not factually inaccurate, as far as I can tell. But it doesn’t adequately get across the essence of Hastings’ journalism or the regard in which he was held.

Bloomberg BNA Cracks Down on Snack Stealers (NY Observer)
Bloomberg BNA has a snack problem. It seems that Bloomberg employees have been raiding the snack pantry and bringing the spoils home. Because, after all, why would you buy the milk when your job gives you cartons for free? To stop would-be snack thieves, the memo proposed installing a pantry cam, and it not-so-gently informed employees that said behavior is a fireable offense.

Tavis Smiley to Be an Anchor for Online Radio Network (NYT)
BlogTalkRadio, the seven-year-old Web service that lets anyone host a radio program online, is teaming up with Tavis Smiley, the public television and radio host. Starting Tuesday, Smiley will anchor a weekday show on BlogTalkRadio, varying from 20 minutes to however long he wants to talk, and produce programs from other contributors under the Tavis Smiley Network.

The Return of Madonna Badger (WWD)
Advertising maven Madonna Badger, who has endured unimaginable tragedy, is back at work with a sharpened sense of resolve. Her office at the Badger & Winters ad agency in Manhattan is decorated with pictures of and artwork by her three young daughters — 9-year-old Lily and 7-year-old twins, Sarah and Grace — who perished in a Christmas morning blaze in 2011 that horrified the nation. Along with the children, Badger’s parents, Pauline and Lomer Johnson, also died in the blaze that consumed her Victorian-era home in Stamford, Conn.

Hulu, Seeking A Buyer, May Shift Course (NYT)
This year Hulu reached a milestone: viewers streamed more than one billion videos on the site in a single three-month period. But the valedictory lap did not last long. Even as the number of views were adding up, so were concerns within the company about the site’s future.